


Catharsis

by aceofhearts61



Category: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (Bay Movies), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - All Media Types
Genre: Abandonment Issues, Apologies, Brotherly Affection, Brotherly Angst, Brotherly Bonding, Brotherly Love, Confessions, Crying, Emotional Hurt, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Family, Family Feels, Family Fluff, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Forgiveness, Gen, Hugs, Love, Vulnerability
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-15
Updated: 2020-04-15
Packaged: 2021-03-01 22:48:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,049
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23664886
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aceofhearts61/pseuds/aceofhearts61
Summary: Leo comes clean about why he was so against the turtles becoming human.Post Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows (2016).
Relationships: Donatello & Leonardo & Michelangelo & Raphael (TMNT), Donatello & Leonardo (TMNT), Leonardo & Michelangelo (TMNT), Leonardo & Raphael (TMNT)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 122





	Catharsis

Once the turtles and Splinter finally reach home after their NYPD award ceremony, it’s late, and they’re all tired. Splinter goes straight to his room, bidding his sons good night, and the turtles flop on the sofa in front of the TV.

They find a James Bond movie about to start, and Mikey decides to make some popcorn. Donnie, who would usually end his night alone in his lab, makes no move to leave his brothers. Raphael fingers his key to the city with a faint smile on his face.

Leo steals glances at his three brothers, now coming down from the emotional high of the night. His stomach begins to churn, and a gloomy feeling sweeps over him. He decides he wants to be alone for a while to process the day, so he gets up without a word to his brothers and leaves for the dojo.

Leo has always treated the dojo as a sacred space; the energy feels different here than the rest of the lair. When he’s here alone, it’s relaxing. He stays off the mat and goes instead to the small shrine in the corner that Master Splinter built years ago. He kneels before the shrine, folding his legs underneath him, and bows. He lights a few of the candles and the incense and closes his eyes, not intending to meditate but to quiet his mind enough that he can parse out what’s bothering him.

He’s not sure how long he sits there, but he opens his eyes just as he hears the dojo door slide open. He looks over his shoulder to find Donnie stepping into the room, lingering just in front of the door as if unsure whether Leo will tolerate him here now.

“Hey,” Donnie says.

“Hey,” says Leo, matching his brother’s quiet tone. He gets on his feet and moves to sit on the wooden bench that overlooks the training area, his shell to Donnie.

Donnie reads him right and goes to join him, sitting on Leo’s left.

“You okay?” says Donnie.

“Yeah,” Leo replies. “I’m fine. It’s just been a long day.”

Donnie nods.

They sit together in silence for a minute, the candles still burning on the shrine nearby and casting a soft glow onto them. 

“Leo—” Donnie starts. “Can I ask you something personal?”

Leo looks over at his purple-banded brother. “Yeah. Of course.”

Donnie hesitates, not looking at Leo. “You’ve really never wondered what it might be like? Living life as a human?”

 _Oh_ , Leo thinks. _This again._ He feels himself wilt. He knows they never really talked about it, him and Donnie. Beyond fighting with Raph the one time, Leo never talked about it with any of his brothers. He just made an executive decision all on his own, one he later withdrew. Donnie filled in the blanks for Leo when the eldest turtle shut down his purple ooze discovery. Strategic advantage, that’s what Donnie said. He reasoned on Leo’s behalf the way he believes Leo always does—but for once in his life, the smartest of the turtles had been wrong.

“I’m not trying to make you feel bad about before,” says Donnie. “I really am just curious. Mikey and Raph have been tired of the restrictions on our lives for a while. And if I’m honest, I’ve had my own fantasies about what I would do if I could do anything. I just want to understand how it is that you’re so cool with the way things are. Maybe if I did, I could adopt your perspective.”

Leo doesn’t know what to say. He is so rarely caught off guard, and now he’s scrambling for a way to answer his brother.

Donnie scoots closer to him and lays his hand on Leo’s shoulder, which surprises the older turtle a second time.

“Leo,” Donnie says softly. “I’m not going to judge you. Please, trust me.”

 _You know nothing about feelings_ , Donnie said on that flight home from Brazil. It had stung more than Leo wanted to admit and more than he would’ve anticipated. Now that Donnie is asking him to open up about his feelings on a sensitive subject, he realizes that he’s afraid—afraid of being rejected, ridiculed, criticized, abandoned.

Abandoned. That’s what he feared most of all, when Donnie showed him what the purple ooze could do.

Leo shakes his head and looks up, keeping his gaze straight ahead. “You know what makes a good strategist?” he says. “The ability to see the far-reaching consequences of all your decisions. All Mikey and Raph saw when they imagined being human was living topside, all the fun they could have, the freedom…. They weren’t thinking about the other inevitable changes that kind of transformation would cause. To us, to our relationships, our work....”

Donnie doesn’t take his hand off Leo’s shoulder. “What do you mean?” he says. “We still would’ve been ourselves. We still would’ve been ninjas and brothers.”

“No,” Leo replies, his voice sharp as he turns his head to look at Donnie. “No, we wouldn’t have. You would be a scientist, Raph would be a pro athlete, Mike would do God knows what, and…. and I would be the only one left trying to pursue this path because a ninja is the only thing I know how to be.”

Donnie looks at his brother with sensitive, gentle eyes.   
  
Leo looks away again, hating the feeling of being so vulnerable. “I knew if we became human, you would leave. You would all leave. We wouldn’t keep living together, training together, working together. Human siblings don’t have what we have.”

“Leo….” Donnie says. He wraps his arm around Leo’s shoulders and pulls his brother against him in a hug. 

Leo surrenders to the gesture, leaning into Donnie as he feels shame wash over him. “I was selfish,” he whispers. “I wasn’t thinking about what would make you guys happy. I was just thinking about myself. I realized that, so I let you all decide before we went after Krang. And when Raph smashed the canister…. I was relieved. I’m sorry.”

Donnie brings his other arm around Leo and folds his hands on Leo’s shoulder. He’s got his head against his brother’s. His eyes start to burn with tears that he stops himself from shedding.

“I should’ve been a better brother,” Leo says. “You and Raph and Mikey deserve better.”

Donnie feels a tear escape his left eye and roll hot down his cheek. “I love you,” he says, his voice pitched low. “Raph and Mikey love you. We were never going to leave you, Leo. We’re not just here with you because we don’t have a choice. We’re here because we love you and each other. Nothing could ever change that.”

Leo finally presses his hand to Donnie’s chest and snakes his other around his brother’s back, turning his face into Donnie’s neck. Leo knows that he and his brothers love each other, but that’s an intellectual knowledge. Rarely does he allow himself to feel that love on an emotional level. His own love for them is too overwhelming, too deep and intense and too much of a vulnerability. And their love for him? He doesn’t know how to feel it. It’s so much easier to focus on being the team leader, on taking care of his brothers and guiding the group’s ninja training. If he’s honest with himself now, maybe some part of him has always feared that his brothers don’t love him as much as he loves them, don’t need him as much as he needs them. If they weren’t turtles and ninjas, they definitely wouldn’t need him.

“Say something,” Donnie says softly.

“I know you mean everything you just told me,” Leo replies, after a moment. “But I also know that if you and the others were faced with the reality of human life, you would change your mind. You wouldn’t have to be ninjas anymore. We wouldn’t have to stay together.”

“You’re wrong. We’ll always be ninjas. Even if there’s no one left to fight one day. And we’ll always need each other. Nobody will ever understand us the way we understand each other. Turning human would not have changed that. Even if we were human, we wouldn’t be like the rest of them. Not after the way we grew up.”

Leo rests against his brother, relaxing for the first time in recent memory. He didn’t know he wanted or needed this kind of comfort, but now that he’s got it, he’s floored by how powerful it is. He just wants Donnie to keep holding him.

“That said,” Donnie continues. “You are more than a ninja, Leo. You could do anything you wanted. You’re smart, you’re disciplined, you’re hard-working. You would be successful at anything you applied yourself to. If you had to become human and quit being a ninja, you would rise through the ranks of the military or become a CIA agent or join the FBI. You’d be just as much of a badass as you are now.”

Leo smiles despite himself.

“And we would miss you every day you were gone because of your job. We would worry about you too.”

Those words hit Leo in the gut. The idea of being missed and worried about is alien to him. He’s the one who worries about his brothers. He’s the one who would miss them.

Donnie starts to rock him, just a little bit. Leo wonders if he even realizes he’s doing it.

“None of us could live without you,” Donnie tells him. “We’ve never been apart for even twenty-four hours, Leo. How could you think we’d be happy without you?”

Leo feels his eyes fill with tears. He’s determined not to cry. The fact that Donatello has even brought him this close is incredible. He slides his hand down Donnie’s plastron to hook that arm around his brother’s waist, hugging him in earnest now.

“I love you too,” he finally says, his voice barely above a whisper. “So much.”

Donnie squeezes Leo in his arms and kisses his brother’s head, which pushes Leo’s tears over the edge. Finally, Donnie starts to pull away a little but doesn’t let go completely, his one arm still around Leo’s shoulders and his other hand resting on Leo’s chest. Leo immediately wipes at his face, embarrassed about crying in front of someone else.

“You should tell Raph and Mikey why you didn’t want us to be human,” Donnie says. “They deserve to know. They’ll understand.”

Leo nods, knowing Donnie’s right.

Donnie rubs Leo’s shell and smiles at him. “Come on. I’ll go with you.”

Raph and Mikey are watching the Bond flick, popcorn bowl between them, and they barely glance away from the TV screen when their two other brothers approach.

“Hey, guys,” Donnie says.

“What’s up, Dee?” says Mikey, reaching into the popcorn.

“Leo’s got something to say.”

“Can’t it wait?” says Raph, looking at the screen.

“No.”

Mikey stuffs popcorn in his face, as Raph reaches for the remote on the coffee table and hits the “mute” button.

“All right,” Raph says. “We’re listening.”

Leo swallows, suddenly filled with anxiety.

Donnie rests his hand on Leo’s shell, and that helps.

“I want to explain why I shut down the idea of us drinking the purple ooze so quickly,” Leo says.

“Why?” says Raph. “That’s in the past now. It doesn’t matter.”

“It does matter. I behaved dishonorably, and you two deserve an explanation. And an apology.”

That gets Raph and Mikey’s attention, their eyes sparking with surprise as they focus on their eldest brother. They can count the number of times Leo’s apologized to them for something on two hands.

Leo lowers his gaze to the floor, his shame and guilt returning. “I tried to stop you all from becoming human because I didn’t want us to split up,” he says. “If we were human, we would stop being ninjas. We’d go our separate ways. You’re all I have. Being a ninja is who I am. I would rather spend the rest of my life being an outcast, living in the sewers, than lose you and my purpose.”

Raph and Mikey’s mouths hang open now.

“It was selfish,” Leo continues. “Trying to stop you from making your own decision. I put my own happiness over yours. I didn’t think about your well-being. For that, I’m sorry. I realized I was wrong, and that’s why I let you decide what we should do before we went after Krang.”

Leo’s afraid to look at Raph and Mikey and find anger, resentment, or disgust on their faces. He keeps his eyes downcast, feeling his face grow hot.

Raphael stands up and approaches Leo, who doesn’t look up at his brother until the bigger turtle is right in front of him.

Raphael’s looking at him with a mix of tenderness and sadness that Leo can’t remember ever seeing on his face before. They hold eye contact for a long moment, before Raphael wraps his arms around Leo and pulls him into a bear hug. Leo’s caught off guard again, but doesn’t waste much time hugging his brother back.

“You should’ve just told us what you were thinking from the start,” Raph murmurs. “I know I’ve talked about leaving before, but I didn’t mean it. I’d never hurt you on purpose, Leo. That’s one reason I smashed that canister.”

Leo feels a painful lump rise in his throat. He can’t let himself cry again; Raph would never let him live it down.

Raph looks at Donnie, who continues to stand behind Leo, and Donnie smiles at him. 

“I’m sorry I told you my opinion’s the only one that matters,” says Leo.

“I know you’re sorry,” Raph says. “And I forgive you.”

“I love you, Raph,” Leo says, his voice thin and raspy. “I need you.” 

The declaration knocks the wind out of Raphael, who hasn’t heard those words from his big brother since they were kids. Suddenly, Raph’s eyes are misty, and all the irritation, resentment, and anger he’s felt toward Leo the last several years evaporate. He squeezes Leo closer and buries his face in Leo’s shoulder, trying to pull himself together. When he lifts his head again, he takes a big breath.

“I love you too,” Raphael says to Leo. “And I’d need you even if we were human. You gotta believe me.”

Raph pulls out of the hug after another few moments and takes Leo’s face in both his hands, looking at his brother before pressing his forehead to Leo’s. Leo grips Raph’s wrists in his own hands, as they stand together like that with their eyes closed.

When they open their eyes again, Mikey’s hovering right next to them, already sniffing with wet tracks in his mask. He looks heartbroken, and Leo’s afraid it’s because he lost his one chance at human freedom. The eldest turtle braces himself for Mikey’s outburst, for the blame and the anger and the pain Mikey’s surely been bottling up ever since Raph smashed the ooze canister and probably before that.

Raphael steps back from Leo to let Mikey face him, and Mikey comes to stand before his blue-banded brother.

“Mikey, I—” Leo starts. “I’m sorry.”

Mikey flings his arms around Leo’s neck, pressing them together, and Leo’s thrown off balance for a second, staggering against his little brother. This was not the reaction Leo expected, and it takes him a moment to lift his arms to encircle Mikey.

“I’ve never wanted us to split up,” the youngest turtle says, his voice wobbling. “I had no idea that’s what you thought would happen, Leo, I swear. I wasn’t trying to run away. I just wanted to be able to have fun up there—but I wanted us to do it together. I never wanted to stop being a ninja or leave you behind.” Mikey sniffs again, tears streaming down his face and onto Leo’s skin. “Now, I feel like the biggest jerk in the world and the worst brother. I never meant to scare you, Leo. I’m sorry.”

Leo feels his own eyes sting again as emotion wells up into his heart and his throat, but he smiles and hugs his brother a little more closely. “You have nothing to apologize for,” he says, his voice quiet. “You couldn’t have known what I was thinking. You’re not a jerk, Mikey, or a bad brother. You’re great.”

“I love you so much, dude,” Mikey says. “I can’t believe you thought I could live without you.”

Leo’s smile deepens. “I love you too, Michelangelo.”

Mikey steps back out of their hug, not even trying to wipe his face dry, and seizes Leo by the shoulders. “Why’d you act like a dick instead of just telling us how you felt? God, you’re worse than Raph sometimes. You have to tell us what you feel, Leo. It’s important. And you can’t expect us to guess all the time.”

Leo dips his head in chagrin, remembering what Donatello said to him on that airplane again. “You’re right,” he says. “I’ll try to do better.”

Mikey nods, calming down now. “Good.”

Leo meets Mikey’s eyes and offers a small smile.

The air is thick with emotion, and now that it’s all been let out, the turtles are subdued.

Mikey drops his hands from Leo’s shoulders, and Leo straightens up.

“The police chief gave us her blessing to reveal ourselves,” the blue-banded turtle says. “If any of you ever want to test it out, I’d be cool with that.”

Donnie, Raph, and Mikey silently accept their leader’s permission.

Leo takes a deep breath, feeling wrung out. He’s not used to expending so much emotional energy. “I'm going to bed, guys.”

“Good idea,” says Donnie, with a grin and a twinkle in his eye.

They end up pushing the coffee table out from between the TV and the sofa and filling the floor with their shikibutons (Japanese sleeping cushions), blankets, and pillows. They go to sleep side by side on their plastrons, hands resting on each other and legs pressed or thrown over each other’s.

When Leo wakes up first the next morning, he lies there in the quiet lair, listening to his brothers’ slow breathing and just enjoying their presence. Smiling. 


End file.
